It has been proven many times that photos and illustrations help people remember things quickly and easily. So why not use the power of visuals in improving your English communication skills? How? Write English captions on photos and drawings you have! Start with your treasure box of old printed photos. You can write your captions lightly at the back of the photos. If it’s an event, try to remember when it was, what happened, and why that photo was taken. Who are in the photos? What are they doing? What are interesting objects did you notice in the photos? Answer these questions of course in English and write at the back of the photo paper. Other sources of photos are your family photo albums. The good thing about photo albums is the space provided to put descriptions on. If you don’t have many photos or drawings to write captions on, scour the internet for millions of them...

I was in a famous fastfood branch waiting for my cashier to serve the meal I ordered, when I overheard the old traveling Japanese man by the next cashier asking her “Is it OLD?”, referring to the coffee she was serving. His cashier, misunderstood OLD with COLD, and answered the Japanese, “HOT sir”. It wasn’t quiet at all by the counter and the cashier was away from her cash register getting a cup under the cabinet, so, the miscommunication was acceptable. The Japanese repeated himself, “NO, is it OLD?” and the Filipina answered back “HOT sir.” This second time was less acceptable. The Japanese asked again, so the Filipina moved back to her register and told the Japanese the coffee would be HOT. Frustrated with the cashier’s answer, the Japanese rephrased his question, “No, how long? WHEN?”. The cashier got more...

Growing up, I had a limited English word list to describe emotions, actions, or even people in certain ways. During the past three years, however, I’ve been adding new adjectives to my list more actively than before. One of the ways I’ve been doing to learn new adjectives is using images and charts. Back when I was in high school in the Philippines, I looked at a facial expression chart posted inside our guidance counselor’s office. Drawn in the chart were faces showing different emotions, and below each face was the English word to describe the expression. I didn’t think of learning words from the chart that time. I just thought it was creative and cool. Now, I think of it as a learning tool as well. Using the facial expression chart as a learning tool was probably the primary intention of the first person who created a chart like this. And it’s good that...

When learning new English nouns—the words that refer to people, places, things, or ideas—a visual dictionary will help you retain the words in your mind effectively. It’s just like when a child learns what the word apple means, a parent will show the child an apple or an image of an apple to help the child create a mental image of an apple, which is usually a red fruit (sometimes it’s green!). So next time the child sees the actual fruit, she will remember to call it apple. There are more nouns that are uncommon than apple, however, and you will likely want to see images of these nouns to remember them. Thus, you may want to use a visual dictionary in this situation. The highly-recommended visual dictionaries that you can look for copies in your library or bookstores are: Merriam-Webster’s Visual Dictionary by Merriam-Webster (Oct 1, 2006) Ultimate Visual Dictionary...

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I started this blog to randomly write about different topics I am interested in. Just random thoughts here and there, but most are in education, internet, and travel.

In my spare time, I watch korean dramas online, sing korean songs, learn Spanish and Korean, visit the library, go shopping, blog, ride a bike, and read a book. Did you notice something? It seems that I don't want to stop learning even in my spare time! Well, I always love to learn and explore new things.

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